The Property of a Lady - Elizabeth Adler [148]
After hailing a cab, he asked to be taken to a deli on Sixth Avenue. He would get himself a bite of lunch and maybe pay a visit to Missie. He hadn’t seen her in a couple of months, been too busy traveling to Chicago and back on Oriconne business, but he guessed she had been busy too. She had said that Madame Elise worked her girls real hard. He sure had missed her, but he was playing it her way, waiting for a year like she’d asked, and at the end of it he just knew it would pay off. By then he would be a rich man, famous too, probably, as the owner of King O’Hara’s, and she would become his wife; queen to his king.
Sliding into a booth, he ordered pastrami on rye and a celery tonic. He took out a notepad and wrote down some figures, smiling as he added them up. He sipped his drink, waiting for his pastrami, casually picking up the newspaper lying on the table. He wasn’t much of a readin’ man, he was too busy for that, but he glanced through it idly and almost choked on the celery tonic when he saw the picture of Missie on the front page. He scanned the report quickly, scarcely able to believe what he was reading.
“B’jaysus,” he roared angrily, clearing the table with a single blow of his arm. After throwing a couple of dollars onto the counter, he strode from the deli and took a cab over to Missie’s apartment.
“She’s gone, sir,” the porter told him smugly, “she and the little girl. The maid went too. All of them. To Germany. Married a millionaire,” he added with a grin, “like all good showgirls.”
His virtuous Missie a showgirl? And he must have been the only man in New York who didn’t know it! O’Hara strode down Broadway to the New Amsterdam Theater, burning with anger. Workmen on ladders were taking down Verity’s name from the marquee but her picture was still out front along with the others.
O’Hara stared at it for a long time. Tears stung his eyes and he doubled up in physical pain. Missie had promised to give him an answer in a year’s time. She had promised And now look how she had cheated him, working as a showgirl and running off with some millionaire. His colleen, his love. If she was here now he would have strangled her with his bare hands. He would have hanged for Missie O’Bryan.
Eddie had reserved two suites on the Majestic, one for himself and Missie, and the other for Azaylee and her nurse, Beulah. He was pleased with his bride as they boarded the ship; she looked beautiful and she also looked like a lady in her elegant Elise violet coat with the sable collar. The steward showed them into their staterooms and she spun round laughing with delight.
“But it’s wonderful, Eddie, just marvelous,” she cried, racing from room to room, counting. “A sitting room, two bedrooms, two dressing rooms, two bathrooms.” She was as excited as a child and his eyes were speculative as he studied her; perhaps tonight would be more interesting than he had thought after all. He glanced at his watch. They were to sail on the tide at six, and dinner the first night out would be early and informal. Suddenly he could not wait for it all to be over with, to have her in bed with him.
Azaylee rapped on the door, then rushed in with Beulah at her heels, as excited as Missie. “Did you know there’s a promenade for walking dogs on the very top deck?” she demanded. “And a special lamppost for them, and kennels? Missie, we could have brought Viktor, after all.”
“Darling, Viktor is too old to travel anymore,” she replied soothingly. “He’s much better off with Rosa. You know she will take care of him. Besides, we shall see him lots. Eddie says he has so much business here we shall be back and forth across the Atlantic like yo-yos.”
“Truly?” Azaylee’s face brightened, but she said sadly, “I shall miss him so much, though, matiushka.”
Missie shooed her out onto the deck. They watched for a long time as the tugs pulled the big ship from her berth and Manhattan’s burgeoning